Once placement of an introducer needle within a blood vessel of a patient has been confirmed, a clinician may temporarily occlude flow in the blood vessel and remove the introducer needle, leaving a catheter in place within the blood vessel. The clinician may also attach a device to the catheter for fluid infusion and/or blood withdrawal. This process has been somewhat difficult in practice since many catheter placement sites simply do not allow easy occlusion of the blood vessel. Additionally, even when such occlusion is achieved, it may be imperfect, resulting in blood leaking from a catheter assembly housing the catheter and endangering medical personnel.
Catheter assemblies have thus been provided in the art that provide a variety of seals or “septa” for preventing outflow of fluid during and following removal of the introducer needle from the blood vessel. A septum may be secured within the catheter assembly via friction and/or adhesive between the septum and a wall of the catheter assembly. However, in some instances, septum dislodgement may occur in response to pressurization of the catheter assembly, which may result from venous pressure, fluid injection under high or low pressure, flush of the catheter assembly, blood collection, etc. Septum dislodgement presents a risk of exposure by medical personnel to blood or other fluids. Accordingly, there is a need in the art for devices, systems, and methods that provide securement of the septum.